Did She Marry an Imposter?

March 27, 2014

After a whirlwind four-month romance last year, Sheri married her soon-to-be ex, Tim. She claims he told her he was a retired doctor, former professional hockey player, wealthy businessman and Canadian Air Force pilot. But one month after the wedding, Sheri says she grew suspicious that Tim was cheating — and soon unraveled what she calls a web of lies. She says she learned from a news story that Tim had previously operated a pain management clinic in Texas — without a medical license and under a different name — and spent one year in prison for stealing nearly $30,000 from the parent company that owned the clinic. How could she not have known about Tim’s past? In a Dr. Phil exclusive, Tim — via satellite — shares his side of the story, in an effort to clear his name. Why does he say the allegations are bogus? Plus, what did the Dr. Phil staff find when they investigated Tim’s history? How will he react to the findings?

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Tim and Sheri, the day they got engagedSheriTim

Swept off Her Feet

Sheri says she thought she hit the love lottery when she met Tim — a successful doctor from Beverly Hills and a wealthy and well-traveled business entrepreneur. They had a whirlwind romance, and just four months after they met, she became a doctor’s wife — or so she thought.

Sheri explains how their “happily ever after” began to fall apart.

Suspecting her husband may be cheating, Sheri began to investigate — and uncovered a shocking secret from Tim’s past.

Sheri says she has lost at least $50,000 paying for their wedding and supporting Tim for six months, and she doesn’t want any other women to fall victim to what she claims are Tim's deceptions. “I married a con man,” she alleges.

Although Tim told producers that he couldn’t come to the show because Sheri has his passport and doesn’t want him there, it appears that Tim was deported.

In a Dr. Phil exclusive, Tim joins the show via satellite from Canada to set the record straight. He says that it was his understanding that he and Sheri would pay for their wedding debt together, but since the demise of their relationship, she’s now saying that he’s responsible for all of it. “I showed her how much money I had stashed, and I think she got upset about that because I was not willing to cash that in to pay off debt — debts that I feel are not mine,” he says. Tim says when Sheri learned of the bad business deal in Texas that landed him on the news and in prison, she ran to the media instead of coming to him for an explanation.

Is Tim wealthy, as Sheri claims he led her to believe? Dr. Phil uncovers what appears to be a discrepancy.

Tim explains that his money has been moved from the John Hancock account. When asked how he sent an image of the website with his name and a fake account number, he claims a banker friend of his made it — because he wanted to protect the location of his money.

Tim claims to have a cache of gold coins, worth as much as $100,000, and shared a photo of them with Sheri. Dr. Phil sees a problem with the photo.

“Did you tell her you were a retired psychiatrist?”

Dr. Phil goes over Tim’s reported aliases from various public records:

Timothy John Szabolcsi: Date of birth: 8/20/1961, place of birth: Burnay

James Szadolci: Date of birth: 8/1/1960, place of birth: Florida

Andrew James Szadolc: Date of birth: 8/1/1961

Andrew J. Szadoic: Date of birth: 8/20/1959

Andrew Szadolo: Date of birth: 8/20/1959

Dr. Phil points out that there are six names, four different dates of birth, two places of birth and two different social security numbers. “I’m puzzled, puzzled, puzzled. So, please explain,” he says.

“There’s nothing to explain. I’ve only used two names. I don’t know where these other ones came from. They’re not affiliated with me at all,” Tim says. He says it’s very common for people to misspell his name.

Dr. Phil reviews Tim’s educational background, which reportedly includes a B.S. in Science and Psychology, an M.S. in Clinical Mental Health, an M.B.A. in Business and Organizational Psychology, and a Psy.D. in Organizational Psychology. Tim confirms that is all correct. When Dr. Phil shows a piece of paper with letterhead that reads “From the law offices of Andrew J. Szadolci,” Tim says he’s never seen it before.

Dr. Phil digs further into Tim’s education claims. “University of Budapest does not exist.”

Sheri claims that Tim told her he played professional hockey for the Hartford Whalers and the Los Angeles Kings. Tim says he played hockey as a kid but never made it onto a professional team. “I never said that I physically played and got paid by them,” he says. And, in response to his reported claim that he was a NASCAR driver, Tim says he once owned a team. “Did I own a NASCAR driver’s license? Yes, I did. Did I drive the car? Yes, I did. It was a hobby. We paid for the car. We had a few sponsors on the car. It’s not a job. It’s not a living,” he says.

Dr. Phil says, “We talked with NASCAR’s corporate representatives, and they said, ‘Our records reveal that Andrew J. Szadolc has never been licensed as a team owner or driver within the NASCAR organization. Although Mr. Szadolc applied for a license to race in NASCAR’s lower-level weekly series, he never completed the application process. He has an outstanding sum due to NASCAR related to that application process. We can also confirm there is no such team as Salem Racing.’”

Tim says he was licensed and raced for a year, but his partners didn’t complete the payment to them. “As a result, they consider the license not to have been issued,” he says.

Dr. Phil tells Sheri that Tim wrote him an email. In it, he wrote that he regrets keeping information from Sheri, but says Sheri’s past isn’t all that clean either and that she kept secrets from him as well.

Tim adds, “Obviously, I must not be that bad of a guy, considering that after two months of being apart, we got back together, and as you’ve seen the text messages I sent, it was like, ‘I love you again,’ and we were spending time sleeping together and trying to repair things. But I know she’s going to act like it never happened, even though you do have the text messages to show.”

In a previous interview, Sheri examines a binder of printed text messages that Tim gave the producers. Although she says some of it seems a little familiar, they look odd to her, with words outside the text box area. “He clearly has altered something. I think this shows what lengths he will go to, to create a ruse. He will do research and sit down to create things, and this is exactly what he did to me to prove he was a psychiatrist.”

Back onstage, Dr. Phil asks Sheri, “Is there a future for the two of you?”